Attributions and Attitudes of Mothers and Fathers in the United States

Abstract

SYNOPSIS Objective. The present study examined mean level similarities and differences as well as correlations between U.S. mothers' and fathers' attributions regarding successes and failures in caregiving situations and progressive versus authoritarian attitudes. Design. Interviews were conducted with mothers and fathers in 139 European American, Latin American, and African American families. Results. Interactions between parent gender and ethnicity emerged for adult-controlled failure and perceived control over failure. Fathers reported higher adult-controlled failure and child-controlled failure attributions than did mothers, whereas mothers reported attitudes that were more progressive and modern than did fathers; these differences remained significant after controlling for parents' age, education, and possible social desirability bias. Ethnic differences emerged for 5 of the 7 attributions and attitudes examined; 4 remained significant after controlling for parents' age, education, and possible social desirability bias. Medium effect sizes were found for concordance between parents in the same family for attributions regarding uncontrollable success, child-controlled failure, progressive attitudes, authoritarian attitudes, and modernity of attitudes after controlling for parents' age, education, and possible social desirability bias. Conclusions. This work elucidates ways that parent gender and ethnicity relate to attributions regarding U.S. parents' successes and failures in caregiving situations and to their progressive versus authoritarian parenting attitudes.